After high school, Eva Waweru ’30 took a customer service role at Laikipia Cereal Millers in Nanyuki, Kenya. Her responsibilities included milling cereal into flour, packaging it, and serving customers.

As she spent more time at the mill, Waweru began to notice that some of the work was done manually. She started wondering whether there was a more efficient way to do it.

“What if I could make my work easier?” became a question she kept returning to.

That curiosity sparked her interest in automation and mechanization and eventually shaped her decision to pursue Mechatronic Engineering at Ashesi University.

Waweru first learned about Ashesi through her school counselor during a transition program organized by Daraja Academy for students who had recently completed high school. She was drawn to Ashesi’s combination of classroom learning and practical experience, as well as its emphasis on leading with integrity.

The transition program also gave her an early opportunity to experience some of those values. Through its community service component, she worked at Nanyuki Hospital, providing administrative support to the dialysis unit, laboratory, and other departments.

“It was quite a good experience, engaging with the community and broadening my horizons,” she says.

The program’s entrepreneurship component introduced Waweru to business planning and pitching ideas to investors. During a business ideation competition, she proposed selling customized phone accessories in her community, where residents had to travel long distances to find them. Her idea placed in the top five.

Now beginning her undergraduate journey at Ashesi, Waweru carries with her a simple reminder: “You have something unique in you; the first step is always what it takes to bring it out.”